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Wisdom about creativity.
What people have learned about creativity the hard way, and what the classics said about it first.
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From the library
Brevity is the soul of wit.
The painter should aim at universality.
There is no wealth but life.
Energy is eternal delight.
Whoso would be a man must be a nonconformist.
Vanity working on a weak head produces every sort of mischief.
Invention is one of the great marks of genius.
To thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man.
Love is anterior to life, posterior to death, initial of creation, and the exponent of breath.
Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful.
Water, water, every where, nor any drop to drink.
The ancients who showed their skill in practising the Tao did so, not to enlighten the people, but rather to make them simple and ignorant.
Length of days is in her right hand; and in her left hand riches and honour.
We know what we are, but know not what we may be.
The painter strives and competes with nature.
When we build, let us think that we build for ever.
The busy bee has no time for sorrow.
Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm.
A lady’s imagination is very rapid; it jumps from admiration to love, from love to matrimony in a moment.
The greatest natural genius cannot subsist on its own stock.
Hence the sage is able (in the same way) to accomplish his great achievements. It is through his not making himself great that he can accomplish them.
The way of man is froward and strange: but as for the pure, his work is right.
Full fathom five thy father lies; of his bones are coral made.
The mind of the painter must resemble a mirror.
Nature contains the elements, in colour and form, of all pictures.
What is now proved was once only imagined.
A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.
Now arms, however beautiful, are instruments of evil omen, hateful, it may be said, to all creatures. Therefore they who have the Tao do not like to employ them.
The hand of the diligent shall bear rule: but the slothful shall be under tribute.
The play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king.
He is a poor disciple who does not excel his master.
Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might; for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave, whither thou goest.
No bird soars too high, if he soars with his own wings.
The poet is the sayer, the namer, and represents beauty.
They should think their (coarse) food sweet; their (plain) clothes beautiful; their (poor) dwellings places of rest; and their common (simple) ways sources of enjoyment.
Deceit is in the heart of them that imagine evil: but to the counsellors of peace is joy.
Did my heart love till now? forswear it, sight! For I ne'er saw true beauty till this night.
Painting is adorned with infinite possibilities which sculpture cannot command.
Thus it is that the Great man abides by what is solid, and eschews what is flimsy; dwells with the fruit and not with the flower. It is thus that he puts away the one and makes choice of the other.
He that sendeth a message by the hand of a fool cutteth off the feet, and drinketh damage.
Our revels now are ended. These our actors, as I foretold you, were all spirits and are melted into air, into thin air.
The painter who works from nature should have a window, which he can raise and lower.
All in the world know the beauty of the beautiful, and in doing this they have (the idea of) what ugliness is; they all know the skill of the skilful, and in doing this they have (the idea of) what the want of skill is.
The slothful hideth his hand in his bosom; it grieveth him to bring it again to his mouth.
When the intelligent and animal souls are held together in one embrace, they can be kept from separating. When one gives undivided attention to the (vital) breath, and brings it to the utmost degree of pliancy, he can become as a (tender) babe. When he has cleansed away the most mysterious sights (of his imagination), he can become without a flaw.
Deliver thyself as a roe from the hand of the hunter, and as a bird from the hand of the fowler.
That whereby the rivers and seas are able to receive the homage and tribute of all the valley streams, is their skill in being lower than they;—it is thus that they are the kings of them all. So it is that the sage (ruler), wishing to be above men, puts himself by his words below them, and, wishing to be before them, places his person behind them.
A slothful man hideth his hand in his bosom, and will not so much as bring it to his mouth again.